


Nobody fears the height, we all just fear the fall.

by eurydicule



Category: Snowboarding RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-23
Updated: 2015-01-23
Packaged: 2018-03-08 19:09:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,735
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3220163
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eurydicule/pseuds/eurydicule
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There are things nobody has ever told Iouri about hospitals at 3 am...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Nobody fears the height, we all just fear the fall.

**Author's Note:**

  * For [nychthemera](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nychthemera/gifts).



> This was written for the prompt 'hospitals at 3am'. Nychthemera came up with that one because she's a genius & an inspiration. I can't wait to see what you're going to come up with. 
> 
> The whole story is slightly AUish in that I never wish anything of this kind to happen to either of them. Just so we're clear on this. 
> 
> The title is a line from Dessa's The Crow. 
> 
> Enjoy!

**Nobody fears the height, we all just fear the fall**

It should not be so cold in here, that is the thought Iouri's mind seems to be stuck on when he catches up with himself, suddenly conscious, perhaps waking up from a slumber he did not realize he had fallen into. He is used to the cold, mind you, born a Russian boy, bread a professional snowboarder in Switzerland, spending half of his adolescent weekends in the halls of any and every museum within the vicinity of his hometown, all of them vast, subdued, and artificially cooled down. However, this is different. This is a coldness that he hasn't anticipated, not like this, the temperature seemingly dropping by the hour. Perhaps it really is, perhaps it's not just a figment of his restless imagination. The sound of his zipping up his jacket seems to echo on endlessly, but for all it is worth, Iouri still cannot seem to shake off the cold that is creeping up on him. It seems to be starting far down the hall, soundlessly sliding up the white linoleum, past white closed doors, empty rows of white seats, past white walls, a deserted-looking help desk, and then right under the thick woolen fabric of his clothes.

There are things no one ever told Iouri, things he hasn't known until tonight about hospitals at 3am. No one said anything about the cold. No one ever mentioned the depressing deprivation of any visual stimulus. How the steady stream and flutter of people around him would trickle out until everything that is left of the hectic buzz of the evening hours is the occasional sound of a nurse working the night shift moving about, tiptoeing, as to not disturb the other patients or maybe Iouri, he does not know. He hardly notices either way, too caught up in the oppressing artificial light, the windowlessness of the architecture, only the heaviness in his bones witness to how much time has passed, lost in the sickening bluish hue the artificial white objects around him seem to radiate. It is terrible for everyone else, but for someone like Iouri, who lives and breathes art, photography, colours, life, it is almost unbearable.

The worst about it is that his thoughts seem to come spiraling back now, as there is no other distraction about, and he finds himself thinking of what he's been trying not to think about too much. It does not work, of course. And so suddenly and uninvited they appear before his inner eye, the images he has been trying to suppress, triggered by the nothingness around him, the eerie quiet, the numbing coldness. The stark white of the walls - and that is how he knows this is really bad, when even the walls have given up all pretenses of calming blue and comforting brown, no need for that in an intensive care unit - becomes an immaculate canvas for images Iouri is desperately trying to forget. Crisp white snow all around him, all around them, covering the mountains and the trees, logs, branches, everything, even the blue sky softly layered with translucent clouds. The stark contrast of Shaun, dressed fully in black, inmidst of all that white, the traces they had left in the snow, not going anywhere in particular, happy to discover parts of the mountain where only few other people seemed to be. And there it had been, seemingly waiting for them, just as white, just as crisp, almost pristine looking in the twinkle of the early spring sun - a half pipe: its condition perfect, slightly icy at the edges, but the snow in the middle firm, just perfect.

 

_"I sometimes think that I'm too old for this. I should know better, you know? "_

_Iouri blinks up at Shaun, his hands mechanically continuing to refasten the straps of his board, adjusting them to the changed terrain, once again back on prepared slopes, but his attention is now on the other man, looking at him quizzically. There are some skiers passing by in the far-off distance, wisps of their conversation in bits of French carrying over to where the two of them are standing, and perhaps Iouri has misheard._

_Shaun shrugs with a grin, betraying his words with the aloofness of his manner._

_"I mean, back country, yeah?" he asks, absentmindedly brushing his shoulder and sending a fine sheen of snow tumbling to the ground. "Everyone knows you shouldn't and yet here we are."_

_"You didn't enjoy that?"_

_The straps make a satisfying sound as they are securely fastened and Iouri straightens up, searching for Shaun's eyes behind his sunglasses._

_"Nah, you're kidding? This is the finest powder I've seen in ... weeks. Literal weeks. ... Nevermind, I guess I just need a bit of time to settle back into all of ... this."_

_His words trail out in a gesture circling their snow-white surroundings and everything that is in it._

_Iouri is two seconds away from saying something, but then, glancing over Shaun's right shoulder, he spies the telltale signs of a promising shape of snow in the distance, just down the slope, and despite himself he is cracking into a smile._

_"Well now, I guess today's your lucky day, then. Looks like there's a little something just for you over there..."_

_Shaun turns around, his gaze searching what Iouri sees. As soon as Shaun catches sight of the half pipe, he is breaking into a smile, too, but Iouri registers the fine nuances making that smile different from his own. Shaun's smile is reflecting the genuine joy of seeing something he has not seen in months, maybe, and at the same time and in equal parts there is an unspoken tiredness. But this is most likely just Iouri projecting and conjuring up things that are not there, it has to be, because when Shaun turns around to look at him, all unsettling qualities of his smile are gone._

_"Last one on top of the half pipe pays for dinner tonight?"_

_And he is off in a flash, leaving Iouri behind, puzzled only for a second, before he sets off after Shaun, his Russian curses carried away by the wind unheard._

 

_The smile, genuine this time, Iouri is sure of that, does not leave Shaun's face for what feels like the rest of the day. Being on vacation - and therewith on stolen time anyway - neither of them carries a watch, and the half pipe keeps them busy enough as not to check their phones. Time is passing, surely, steadily, but Iouri is hardly aware of it. When a small group of young snowboarders arrives, none old enough to buy booze even in this country, the both of them take it as a cue to take a break. First being passed off as adults and therewith not deemed worth speaking to, Shaun and Iouri settle into the snow not far from the pipe's entrance, watching as the kids spin up and down the snow a couple of times, ignorant of its impeccable condition or just not in the mood for more than just horsing around._

_"Waste of time, man. They're not even going for it, no dedication."_

_Iouri rolls his eyes and chips a small lump of snow into the bowl containing Shaun's lunch._

_"_ Dude _!"_

_"Maybe they're just doing it for the hell of it? Just for fun?"_

_"Yeah, right. ... Right."_

_Iouri tries to smile, raking a hand through his hair, then fastening and securing it into a ponytail with a twist of his wrist and a rubber band. He catches Shaun watching, chewing on his food but his eyes alert, attentive, but acts as if he doesn't notice. "I can't believe you're really eating this by the way."_

_"I've told you, it's good for you. Very nutritious! Everyone eats it now."_

_"I bet they do. You Americans and your superfoods..."_

_"You're the one to talk, ... Schnitzel."_

_"Oh, shut up. That's-"_

_But Shaun does not shut up, he is never the one to shut up when he knows he has got Iouri cornered like this. And so he keeps rattling off the very short list of Swiss-German words Iouri has taught him, mostly food, and his accent is so willfully atrocious that Iouri instantly regrets having taught him these words in the first place. A tussle in the snow ensues, sending quinoa flying all around them, which, as Shaun is quick to remark before he pushes an armful of snow into Iouri's face, is not a good way to treat this carefully prepared slope. Iouri just shrugs at him, not muttering something only because he does not want to get a mouthful of snow, opting for pushing backwards until he manages to press Shaun down into the snow back-first himself. When they eventually decide to let it go, they realize that the kids have stopped riding and playing around and are watching them instead. Strands of red hair, sticky with snow but still unmistakable, have shaken free of Shaun's head, glowing in the sun that's very slowly starting to set. The kids are staring at them both, recognition making their eyes grow big and round, leaving them standing there open-mouthed. Iouri sighs, the private feeling of the moment gone in an instant. Shaun at his side looks worried for a moment, then a little less tense when he realizes that there are no smartphones or cameras in sight._

_"Well then, what do you think? Time to make their day and show them where a little bit of dedication might get them to in the future?"_

 

Iouri did not even realize how his nails had been digging into the palms of his hands, did not realize either how absorbed in the memory he was, but suddenly he registers the soft melodious tone of someone talking to him in French. Looking up, he finds himself face to face with the nurse working the night shift. It takes him a little bit to realise that he has seen her before, that she was the one listening to him explaining why he was here, who he was and why he could not go in, even if he had wanted to. She had been the one making sense of Iouri's initial stutter, too numb to realize that he was talking to her in Russian (of all things) and then stumbling through English (Shaun) and Swiss-German (home) before finally arriving at French, the language of classrooms and photo shootings, his own vocabulary not tailored to his present situation at all, to a hospital at night and the asphyxiating fear in his heart. Still, she had made sense of him somehow and had refrained from bothering him after that. Iouri had not been listening to a thing she was telling him now.

The way she presses a mug full of steaming tea into his hands speaks of years of training in politeness and then years of experience in convincing patients to do what she thinks is best for them, there is no room to protest. He does not even want to, he finds, after a moment of initial and instinctive refusal, because the warmth seeping from the surface right into the palms of his hands feels good. She is gone, quietly, just as quickly as she must have materialized, before Iouri can even thank her. This time, the French word comes to the tip of his tongue first.

He had been on the phone with Jesse some minutes (a couple of hours, half a lifetime) ago, Shaun's older brother the only person Iouri could think of phoning without losing heart. He had not even been sure whether anyone else had known about Shaun's whereabouts until today, the other man having muttered something about an 'improptu vacation' when he had shown up on Iouri's doorstep barely a week ago. His management was out of the question, as were the other members of what Shaun sometimes referred to as his 'pack', the word taking on different connotations depending on his mood and time of day. There was no way Iouri could have called Shaun’s coach. Shaun's parents, Iouri had not even been able to consider the possibility. So Jesse it had been, and it had been the best choice in the worst of circumstances. Working the mug between his fingers - and momentarily being grateful for the consideration, the heavy weight that gave him something to occupy his hands with - Iouri remembers how extraordinary calm the other man had been, asking Iouri what had happened, where they were now, what the doctors had said . Then Jesse had promised to take the next possible flight and to pass on the message to whom it concerned. The click of his hanging up the phone had echoed in Iouri's mind for the longest time, as had the words Jesse in his calm, composed manner - so unlike his brother - had not said, maybe had not even thought of saying, but maybe he had. Maybe Iouri had heard it in a suppressed but still audible sharp intake of breath, in the shortest of silences between one question and the next. All the questions Jesse had not asked, the same questions working Iouri's mind even now.

_Why did you do it? How could you do that? How could you do that to him?_

 

_It is one of these moments - and they are not as rare as Iouri wishes - when he suddenly finds himself saying something before his brain has the chance to pause and reflect and reconsider. But the words are out as soon as the thought is there and now there is no way to take them back. For a moment, they seem to be hanging in the air, filling the white cloud of Iouri's breath with meaning. With a little bit of luck, they would have been carried off by the wind or dropped down the steep half pipe unheard. But luck is not always on his side._

_"I know how to do it now, you know?"_

_Shaun, just hoisting himself up on the edge again, face hidden by the helmet but his whole body all but leaking confidence, satisfaction because he knows he just laid that run down perfectly, stills. It is only a second and Iouri knows that he should not, he really should not have said that. Then Shaun hoists himself up completely, lays his board down carefully, takes his helmet off slowly. He does not even ask what exactly Iouri means with 'it'. There is only one 'it' and Shaun knows; Iouri knows that is what Shaun thinks. Which makes it even more inexplicable to him why he could not just keep his mouth shut._

_"Since when?"_

_Iouri considers lying briefly, and he would have if he had been with someone else. He is good at lying, normally. But Shaun is better at picking out lies, always has been._

_"I ... stood it the first time a month before Sochi. But consistently... March, maybe?"_

_The way Shaun's face visibly falls, honest to God and not just in a split second, the expression not quickly overcasting his features before being controlled but lasting, almost feels like a physical punch in the gut, the fake smile Shaun produces next like an accompanying kick in the knees._

_"March. ... Is that why you didn't pull it in Sochi?"_

_"You know that's not why I didn't do it in Sochi."_

_"I don't know, do I?"_

_If not for the hurt in his tone, Shaun's voice would be icy, cutting, crunching like the snow beneath his boots, the sound deeper and duller now than before, his steps audibly losing spring from one moment to the next. Iouri has to look away. Neither of them says a word for a long while that stretches thin like the air of high mountains all around them. Sentences form in Iouri's mind but melt again before he can get something, anything, out, utterly at a loss for how to move forward from this point, what to say that could possibly set things right. He does not dare to look at Shaun for help, so he almost misses what Shaun eventually breathes out._

_"Show me."_

_Iouri shakes his head, no, he won't._

_"If you think you can do it on this snow, show me."_

_"Are you sure that's going to help? I mean, are you sure this is going to help you do it? I don't want to ... hinder you or something."_

_Iouri shakes his head again. But already, he can feel the resolve crumbling. To be completely honest, and maybe that is what has pushed the words out of his mouth, he has been thinking about it a lot that day, the snow firm and good, the pipe in excellent condition, no prying eyes in sight except the two of them ever since the small school of snowboarders has moved on. It is a temptation alright, even more so when, looking up, Shaun's eyes are on him._

_"Please. Iouri? ... I just want to see that it's- ... please."_

 

Even with the tea gone, filling him up from the inside with what should feel like pleasant warmth, the emptiness and the quietness of the hallway - if not its coolness - still get under Iouri's skin. His body, restless for so many hours now, tired to the bone and worn out from what feels like more than a day and half a night awake, shifts from stupor to constricted agitation to stupor again and it drains him out. Belatedly, Iouri starts berating himself for not having reacted to the nurse earlier, for not even trying to get something, any information out of her, anything to know what is going on, how Shaun is doing. Maybe knowing would work against the quiet dread in the back of his mind, the black pit of guilt looming just behind, daring him to let his mind wander too far.

_Why did he do it?_

 

_Even halfway through the trick, Iouri knows it is going to turn out perfectly. Everything feels right, the sharp gust of wind on his cheek, the angle, every muscle of his body feeling hot and alert, the board beneath his feet like a part of him spinning exactly the way he wants it to. Once, twice, three times and then the shock of the landing, the instant feeling of triumph surging up even as he slows down, boards out of the pipe. He has done it again. He can do it again. For a moment, Shaun has not been on his mind at all, not in the slightest, but as soon as Iouri bends down to unfasten his strappings, reality catches up with him. He looks up, eyes straining to make out more than just the silhouette of Shaun standing atop the half pipe, watching him. Iouri longs to see his face, to figure out whether he is smiling at him like he hopes he does (even though a small voice inside of him tells him to get real, this is snowboarding, this is Shaun after all, there is just no way that is going to happen). The other man, however, is wearing his helmet again._

_Shaun's voice is greeting him in a muffled way as soon as he is back on the pipe, but that does nothing to hide the sharp precision in his tone. He does not give Iouri enough time to catch his breath, the questions already on his lips. They are technical and precise, of course they are, and Iouri marvels - not for the first time - at the way Shaun understands snowboarding, how it apparently was enough to just watch Iouri do it once to figure it all out completely. Or maybe these detailed questions are just a testament to how long Shaun has been thinking about this, how much it has been on his mind for the past year or so. Deep down Iouri does not even want to know which one it is._

_And then he watches Shaun take a deep breath, strapping on his board._

_"You want to head home? It's getting dark...," Iouri asks, the vague idea of dinner and a quiet night in starting to form at the back of his head._

_Shaun only shakes his head. When he speaks, it sounds as if he is gritting his teeth._

_"No. That's not what I want."_

_He is down in the pipe before Iouri can fully register what is happening._

 

From then on, everything becomes a blur, the dark silhouette of Shaun spinning through the air, the mountain suddenly opening up around him like a frozen white hell, an agonizing long wait with his knees in the snow and his fingers under Shaun's helmet, the roar of a helicopter chopping the air, and then the waiting, the endless waiting in this cold hospital corridor. Iouri sees it all at the same time, every detail before his inner eye, but so sharp that the whole of it becomes an indistinguishable image that torments him.

He is definitely fading in and out of consciousness now, but all he can remember from the short moments of sleep is a feeling of hollowness inside, the image of a vast white expanse extending all around him, the feeling of being alone almost crippling. It is a shapeless nightmare and it comes in fragments. If possible, the hospital around him seems to quiet down even more. During his waking moments, he feels as if he is the only one awake on this entire floor. Time passes slowly, he can feel the heavy weight of the watch on his wrist dragging along, dragging him down with every tick that's coming between what feels like distortedly stretched pauses, but it passes. And then, suddenly, maybe dreaming, maybe asleep, almost delirious at this point, there is a voice and a warm hand reaching out to him.

"Monsieur Podladtchikov?"

The nurse materializes again and Iouri begins to suspect that this is her specialty, creeping up on people when they least expect it. To say that he is anything less than grateful for her appearance would be a lie though, especially because there is a look about her that sends Iouri's heart slamming against his ribcage. It is cautious, not overt, layered too, but there is some glimpse of hope in her eyes, next to something else, something that Iouri forbids himself to work out and interpret at this point.

"He's awake. ... He's asking for you."


End file.
